“Judah, thee shall thy brethren praise; thy hand shall be on the neck of thine enemies; thy father's sons shall bow down before thee. Judah is a lion's whelp; from the prey, my son, thou art gone up. He stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as a lioness; who shall rouse him up? The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, as long as men come to Shiloh; and unto him shall the obedience of the peoples be. Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice vine; he washeth his garments in wine, and his vesture in the blood of grapes; His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white with milk.” –Genesis 49:8-12

Jacob’s blessing over Judah has been translated in several different ways, particularly the phrase shown here as: “until men come to Shiloh…” This is given in the King James version as: “until Shiloh come.” What is not explicit is the meaning of “Shiloh.” We know that it appears later in the books of Joshua and Judges as a place name where the ark and the tabernacle remained until Jerusalem was conquered.

The bowl is 17 inches in diameter and 6 inches high. All of the photographs, the lion and lioness, the ass and colt, the grapes, and the stone carving of the lion, were taken in Israel. The lion, the symbol of the tribe of Judah, is also carved into the exterior (see exterior view in final illustration).